Construction at the Londonderry US naval base in the 1940s Members of the US Navy were sympathetic to the IRA and some even tried to enlist directly with Martin McGuinness, research carried out by a university scholar indicates.

Dr Edward Burke, assistant professor of international relations at the University of Nottingham, uncovered the sailors’ claims whilst compiling material for a new book. Dr Edward Burke’ says his book presents a part of the history of the British Army in Northern Ireland The claims form just one part of a large study, which focuses on what life had been like for British military personnel in Northern Ireland during the 1970s.

Dr Burke spoke to dozens of soldiers, and also discovered stories about the trauma felt by young British recruits over the abuse they got on the streets from women, and the difficulty they had in bringing themselves to kill people.

Originally from Cork, Dr Burke formerly worked in Afghanistan from 2010 to 2011 as deputy head of the International Police Coordination Board in Kabul.

This meant working together with Nato to try and develop the Afghan forces – an experience which left him with a “great respect” for the British Army. A soldier on the streets of Belfast in 1979 It also made him interested in the “culture of a small unit”, and in examining how one such unit behaves compared to another – something which is the focus of his book: ‘An Army of Tribes: British Army Cohesion, Deviancy and Murder in Northern Ireland’.

For the book, he spoke to 36 different former personnel – almost all drawn from three battalions of the British Army: 1st Battalion Scots Guards, 2nd Battalion Scots Guards, and 1st Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders.

He also focused on the years of the early 1970s, simply because they were the most violent of the Troubles.

“I was interested in how they made sense of casualties, how they dealt with coming under fire, how they dealt with having to take life in the UK,” he said.

For example, he said: “In terms of using snipers for example – did they find all their training came readily to them?

“Were they able to, if necessary, take life easily?

“I found the answer was no.

“They’d a major problem with snipers not being able to shoot.

“As one officer put it, you’re trying to train soldiers to go between a W H Smith and an M&S, and it looks just like Britain, and suddenly you have to take life.“I think sometimes in the republican narrative it’s kind of built up that there was a huge distinction between British soldiers and the natives, the Irish people they were sent to police.“And actually, to some extent, these guys did feel there was a close affinity, that they were in the UK, that these people were their people.“They were actually quite shocked when they found that people who looked like them and who they felt an affinity with were [giving them] such a hostile response.”One of the intriguing details to […]